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About DET

DET (Die Evangelischen Theologen) is the theological version of a digital news magazine. The DET authorial team provides insightful, thought-provoking content on a wide range of theological, religious, and even political subjects from current events and culture as well as from the Christian and other religious traditions.

"Theology" is nothing more than thinking, speaking, and writing about God. And since we aren't eternal disembodied heads, that thinking, speaking, and writing always happens at a particular place and time. And that particular place and time is loaded with a host of complicated and interconnected concerns, questions, desires, structures, systems, power dynamics, etc. DET's work is the attempt to understand what people have thought, said, or written about God in their particular places and times in an effort to reflect fruitfully on what we should think, say, or write about God in our particular places and times. It exists as a place to think theologically about the past, present, and even the future.

Die Evangelischen Theologen translates as "the evangelical theologians." The German sense of the term "evangelical" refers broadly to the various Protestant Christian traditions, and even more broadly to all Christian theology that places a living encounter with Jesus Christ at the center of its thinking and speaking about God. As Karl Barth says in his little book, Evangelical Theology: An Introduction, "the word 'evangelical' will objectively designate...that theology which treats of the God of the Gospel" (p5, Barth's emphasis). The theological perspective on offer here, then, is robustly rather than myopically evangelical, and designates a theological perspective that takes shape and develops in different ways within all the Christian traditions. In this way, properly evangelical theology is also ecumenical theology.

[Ed. note: Scott Jackson, Senior Contributing Author, has recently published a series of reflections on the history and significance of DET in celebration of the blog's 9th birthday. Those interested in getting a feel for the work that goes on here are encouraged to consult them: Part 1, Part 2, Part 3.]